February 26, 2025 - Classroom

David stands at the whiteboard with a blue marker uncapped, the old leather briefcase slumped against his desk like a loyal dog.

"Let's tie the last six weeks together," he says. "Not every detail–just the mechanisms. How did a fragile democracy make itself available to a dictatorship?" He hears his own hedging and lets it stand. Precision is the only courage he trusts.

In block letters on the far left: WEIMAR CRISIS. "Anchor one: the political and social aftershocks–Versailles obligations, paramilitary violence, hyperinflation, elite fear of the street." He taps the board once. "This is the soil."

A tick mark. "Then a failed seizure: November 1923. The Beer Hall Putsch collapses in the street, its leader tried, imprisoned, and transformed into a national figure. The lesson wasn't to abandon politics–it was to learn to use it."

Nisha leans forward, elbows on the table. "Right, and the carceral moment produces the text that becomes a program. Intent isn't a mystery if you read." She doesn't say the title. She doesn't need to.

David nods. Next tick: CRASH AND ELECTIONS. "Economic catastrophe in 1929 reframes everything–unemployment, fear, parties realigning; the movement converts agitation into votes. Street power and ballot power reinforce each other."

Marcus raises two fingers, waits for the small chin dip David uses instead of calling on people. "We've been tracking how institutions tried to contain a movement they didn't understand," he says. "Conservative elites thought they were hiring a constituency. They were hiring a project. Consent and coercion aren't opposites–they're tools in sequence." He stops, lets the sentence breathe.

"Good," David says. On the board: APPOINTMENT → FIRE → EMERGENCY POWERS. "January 30, 1933: appointed Chancellor by elites who believe they can channel him. In February, a fire becomes the pretext for sweeping decrees–civil liberties suspended by emergency ordinance. The vocabulary is legal; the effect is extralegal."

He draws a heavier mark. "March 23, 1933: The Enabling Act delegates legislative power to the executive. That's the hinge." He underlines hinge. "From here, Gleichschaltung–coordinating the state–begins: civil service purges, press constraints, party dissolution, the folding of associations into ruling structures."

Jake clears his throat. He keeps his tone even. "With all due respect, Professor, when you say 'hinge,' it sounds like there was no agency left. But there were still votes, right? People supported this. The courts still existed. Newspapers still printed. It wasn't just a switch flipping."

"Yes," David says, grateful for the corrective. He circles hinge and writes in small print beside it: NOT A SWITCH. "Institutional capture often presents as continuity. The forms remain; the content changes. That's why the early months matter–because the forms are how you sell the changes."

Nisha's pencil taps. "And because fear is efficient. You pass one law 'for order,' restructure one ministry 'for efficiency,' and folks adjust their sense of the possible."

"Actually," Marcus says, "the term 'order' is doing work. If your baseline is street violence and parliamentary paralysis, almost any consolidation looks like relief." He turns his laptop slightly, not showing anything, just the gesture of reference.

He draws a bracket under the right half of the timeline and writes: CONSOLIDATION. He leaves the date blank on the board. "Where we are now in the course: coordination moving toward elimination of rivals inside the movement and across the state. Today we're reviewing, but by Friday we'll look at how a regime performs legality while removing the people who made its rise possible." He lets the implications hang without names or dates in marker.

He steps into the open center of the U. "I want each of you to name one mechanism and show where it fits on this timeline," he says. "Not an event. A mechanism. Patronage. Propaganda. Emergency decrees. Administrative law. Youth organizations. Church accommodation. Pick one and say how it interacts with the rest." He pauses. "If you can do that, the exam is a formality."

Jake goes first. "Administrative removal power," he says. "You don't have to jail everyone if you can reassign them, freeze them out, or threaten their pensions. It's legalistic and boring, which is why it works."

Nisha follows. "Media coordination," she says. "Not just censorship–agenda setting. You flood the zone with narratives that make alternatives feel unserious."

Marcus closes the trio. "Selective enforcement," he says. "The law on paper stays the same. Who it touches changes. People notice."

David feels the small relief of a class that can carry itself for a minute. He moves back to the board and, in the margin, writes three small words he will probably erase before the next section uses the room: forms, fear, favors.

The marker squeaks. Outside, a siren passes and fades. Inside, they begin placing mechanisms like pushpins along a decade.

Sarah raises a hand halfway. "Can we… map the last six weeks to our own last six weeks?" she asks, careful. "Just to see the mechanisms without… labels?"

David feels his throat tighten. He buys a second with a glasses-cleaning gesture that fools no one. "Very cautiously," he says. "Mechanisms only. If we leave description and drift into indictment, I'll stop us. Facts must be facts." He taps the left side of the timeline. "On this side, the fire and the enabling statute are mechanisms of legal transformation."

Marcus goes first, voice even. "Six weeks can do a lot administratively," he says. "Executive orders on day one in bulk; removal and replacement of watchdogs; guidance resurrecting an old classification that strips protections; a statute signed that reframes criminal enforcement; a detention order invoking national security. Then a mid-February wave that targets probationary status to move bodies without litigation." He looks up. "Each is a different lever, but they rhyme."

Jake sits forward, respectful but jaw tight. "Professor, that framing makes it sound like the voters didn't matter," he says. "These are policy choices after an election. Calling them 'rhymes' with 1933 implies intent you can't prove. He's not abolishing elections."

From the back door-side corner, Billy lets out a sharp laugh. "It's the same damn move–y'all just won't say it," he says, louder than the room. "You keep bringing up 'fires' and 'hinges' like some spooky history poem. He's enforcing the law. Stop comparing him to a mass murderer."

Nisha's pencil stops tapping. "Folks, the point is mechanisms," she says, clipped. "If you fire the referees, change the rulebook, and flood the field, the scoreboard still looks official. That's literally how coordination works."

"Hey," Billy says, leaning back, boots scuffing tile. "Don't 'folks' me. You don't get to call me a Nazi with a thesaurus."

The air hardens. Door side and window side tilt toward each other like magnets about to snap.

"No," David says, cutting cleanly for once. He steps into the open center, palm up. "We're done with comparison. Today is exam review. History first, always. Mechanisms on this board from 1919 to 1934. That's it." He turns to the whiteboard before anyone can answer. "Define Gleichschaltung in your own words. One sentence. Then list two instruments used to achieve it." He uncaps the marker. "Go."

Chairs scrape. The fluorescent buzz reasserts itself. On the door side, Jake stares at his notebook without writing. Billy watches Nisha. On the window side, Nisha writes fast without looking up. Marcus's jaw sets. He returns to his screen. The U-shape holds, barely.